Murdoch still a house divided

Andrew Hornery

The Murdoch clan descended on St Paul's Cathedral in Melbourne on Tuesday to farewell matriarch Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, but behind the unified facade the all-powerful media dynasty has splintered, with siblings Elisabeth and James Murdoch barely speaking and their ageing father, Rupert, caught in the crossfire.

And while Rupert, wife Wendi, Lachlan and Sarah Murdoch were all highly visible, Elisabeth was keeping a low profile on Tuesday while James flew entirely under the radar.

PS now understands the Murdochs are due to board their private jets, with Rupert, Wendi and daughters Grace and Chloe and head off to the Bahamas, where they will holiday aboard their superyacht Roseharty, which is due to rendezvous with Lachlan, Sarah and their three children aboard their own multimillion-dollar tinnie. It is unclear whether either James or Elisabeth and their families will join them.

At the centre of the fallout has been the phone-hacking scandal which has engulfed not just the family business but the family itself.

Memorial … Rupert and Wendi Murdoch at the service for Dame Elisabeth. Photo: Alex Coppel

Rumours were rife that Elisabeth laid the debacle squarely at James's feet. She publicly revealed her true feelings in August after being invited to the Edinburgh International Television Festival to give the prestigious annual MacTaggart lecture.

During her speech she was critical of James and of her father's beloved News Corp.

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In the latest issue of The New Yorker, the 44-year-old successful media pioneer in her own right revealed the fallout from her controversial speech had been heavy, with James feeling ''betrayed'', while her father ''refused'' to read any of the press she had generated.

She told The New Yorker: ''I should have said more positive things about James. But 99.9 per cent of the reaction was very positive. My team was overjoyed. I had notes from complete strangers. I think some of the nicest things were to get letters and emails from competitors saying 'Thank you.' They were proud after the speech. The only person who didn't like my speech - who told me so - was my dad."

Visible ... Lachlan and Sarah Murdoch with their children Kalan and Aidan at the service. Photo: Reuters

She revealed her father did not speak to her for nine weeks, and finally did so only after his close friend, the Australian journalist Robert Thomson, the then editor of The Wall Street Journal, pressed her to give him a call.

"I think he realised it was not a loving reaction," she says of her father.

Out of sight ...right, James Murdoch with his father; left, Elisabeth Murdoch. Photo: AFP

The New Yorker reports that when she was in New York in November, she went to her father's home for dinner. She did not see James, with whom the magazine reports she ''has not had a personal conversation for many months''.

Adler's name to be erased

Having left his jailbird days behind him, Rodney Adler's ongoing campaign to rehabilitate his image, which included a well-publicised visit to the Pope, has hit a snag.

Adler has invested years and a considerable chunk of cash on shoring up his social standing within the Jewish and broader business communities since he spent two years behind bars over his role in the $5 billion collapse of HIH.

But last week the Supreme Court of Appeal overturned an earlier ruling after an unholy row, which has cost an estimated $1 million in legal fees, erupted over the naming rights of a Melbourne synagogue, which for the past four years had been called the Lyndi and Rodney Adler Sephardi Centre.

The Adlers had given $150,000 to extend the synagogue. In return they had their name inscribed on the building.

However, this did not go down well with the Yehuda family of Melbourne, especially since the lateAlbert Sassoon Yehuda had also donated handsomely to the Sephardi Association of Victoria to build the original synagogue to honour his father Sassoon. For years it proudly bore the name theSassoon Yehuda Sephardi Synagogue. Not long after Albert passed away, his nephew Dan Horesh donated a substantial amount of money to extend the existing building in Hotham Street, East St Kilda, but to his ''horror'', drove past and discovered the building his uncle had built had been renamed after the Adlers.

Horesh sued the Sephardi Association of Victoria Inc in the Supreme Court of Victoria for, among other things, breach of contract. The trial lasted 10 days and the judge ruled against Horesh, who then went on to appeal the decision. On December 13 three judges found in favour of Horesh, meaning the Adlers's names must now be removed.

Walkley walks with Markson

Egos and television newsrooms have long gone hand in hand. However, scuttlebut has been raging around the corridors of Channel Seven's Martin Place HQ over one of its shiny trophies.

No dramas there, however, she was meant to share the gong with colleagues Lee Jeloscek, Adam Walters and Michael McKinnon for their work on the story "The Cabinet Leak" about the NSW government defying its own advice about establishing a monopoly for the supply of the biofuel ethanol.

Markson would not be drawn on any of the gossip coming out of Seven, but she did confirm another Walkley trophy had been ordered and would soon be finding a home in Seven's display case.

Markson, the daughter of spin doctor Max Markson, has landed the plum job of editing Cleomagazine. At 28, she became one of the youngest ever editors of a major Australian magazine, following in the footsteps of Ita Buttrose, Lisa Wilkinson and Mia Freedman.

Rinehart wedding shift

HIGH-POWERED guests are about to make their way to Los Angeles for the January 12 wedding of Ginia Rinehart, youngest daughter of the world's richest woman, Gina Rinehart. PS hears the wedding, which had originally been planned to take place in Perth, will now happen in LA, away from the prying eyes of the Australian media. Ginia, heir apparent to her mother's vast mining empire, is set to marry her fiance Ryan Johnston, son of Beach Boy Bruce, in what is being tipped as a lavish celebration. In September Bruce Johnston told reporters during the Beach Boys tour of Perth that he would soon return for his son's wedding. Ginia and Ryan met at the Institut Le Rosey, the $120,000-a-year private boarding school in Switzerland considered one of the world's most exclusive. Sadly her estranged siblings Bianca, Hope and John are not expected to attend.

Paradise Lost

THE BODY had to be airlifted out of her luxury accommodation in the Fijian islands following the devastating cyclone, however Elle Macpherson (pictured right) has declared she will return to her paradise, Vomo Island, telling friends she thinks it is ''the most spiritual place on earth''. Macpherson has been a regular visitor to Vomo, having spent time there with not one, but two life coaches, mapping out her direction.

Prank hits mark

SUNRISE weather guy Grant Denyer managed to fool his Sunrise mates into thinking he was Seven chief executive's Tim Worner's elderly father on Friday morning. In what has become a tradition, Grant spent his last day on air before holidays pranking his colleagues. Worner was in on the gag, emailing the TV show's hosts asking them to look after his dad Geoff. David Koch later admitted ''there was something pretty weird about this guy but no one wanted to be the first to say something just in case it really was him!'' It took two weeks for Seven make-up artist Eliza Campagna (pictured with Denyer) to create the prosthetic head, neck and hands, and another three hours to put on. The real Geoff Worner, 85, was watching from Perth and thought it was hilarious.